From the Border to the Boardroom
Book Review
I’m not sure if you’ve noticed that many books I share with you are about people’s stories. I read a lot of memoirs because I love learning about people’s stories. I feel like we can learn a lot about people from their stories. We can also see how God has had His hands in their lives, even when He’s not mentioned.
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Today’s book is a memoir by Griselda Castro Abousieman. Griselda graduated from Stanford University with an industrial engineering degree and received her master’s in business administration from Arizona State University. From a young age, she realized her passion was helping and leading people to achieve their goals. And she shares a few stories from her school years that displayed this passion.
But before we get to that, she starts the book by sharing a little bit of her grandmother's story of living in Mexico. Her grandmother learned to deliver babies. So, she would help anyone pregnant to deliver their baby. And she knew how to deliver her own. She delivered a few of hers, and about three of her children, unfortunately, died around the age of 18 months due to measles since there wasn't a vaccine at that time.
Eventually, her mom was born, and Griselda shared a little of her story about how she and her dad moved to Brownsville. Griselda was always determined to learn and help others in their studies.
She shares a story of when she realized that other schools in another part of town had AP or advanced placement classes where students could earn college credits while in high school. She asked one of her teachers why their school didn’t have this option, and her teacher directed Griselda to speak with the principal. Then, the principal said Griselda would have to talk to the district superintendent.
She spoke with the superintendent, and she said, “The response that I got was the most appalling and upsetting response I had ever heard throughout my entire school career. The superintendent basically told me that the reason Porter High School did not have AP courses was due to the prediction that our students at Porter High would not pass such exams, and therefore, it would be a waste of their money.”
Griselda was determined to prove the superintendent wrong. After speaking with her mom, she returned to her teacher and explained everything. He was the physics teacher and the senior class advisor, and he volunteered to teach AP physics to students interested in taking the class. Mind you, this was outside of regular school hours, and this teacher didn’t get paid extra. Another teacher also volunteered to teach AP calculus.
Griselda and her classmates would come to school on Sunday afternoons to learn additional AP physics and calculus classes on top of their regular classes. They studied for months and eventually took the AP test. Many of the students, including Griselds, passed the exams and were able to bring AP classes to the high school!
This whole story could be turned into a movie - like the 2007 movie Freedom Writers.
The book's overall theme is optimism, and she shares reflections at the end of each chapter. Even when she’s sharing stories of the hardships she endured as a child and adult, like stories of the health struggles she and her husband went through with their son, she could see the silver lining.
Griselda will also be a guest on my podcast, and I’m excited to share her story with my audience on Tuesday, October 28th.
With Love, Heidy